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IT'S FRIDAY, MY FAVORITE DAY!!

So another busy week has come and gone.

We had the Deweys down all last week for the 4th of July celebration. Greg had to leave on Thursday to go to work so Lara and the girls decided to stay until Saturday because the weather has been so nice here on the coast. FINALLY summer seems like it is really here. Anyway, a friend of ours, Capt. Mike offered to take Lara, the girls and Dave out in his boat to go crabbing last Friday. They were successful and came back with four small but meaty crabs. While they were waiting for the crab pots to fill, Capt. Mike took them over to the marina where he treated them to ice cream and a boat ride up the Nehalem River. I waved to them from the deck as they went by. They were gone for a couple of hours and that gave me a chance to do some housework (I cleaned my windows and washed laundry). When they returned I had fixed some spaghetti, just in case they came home empty-handed. We split the crabs between us and after I shelled my two crabs I had enough to make a quiche for the next day. It was delicious.

While the kids were down, they helped Granddad with a project. We bought some vinyl material to cover the boat seats on our small boat that they use for crabbing when they come down. The old covering was ripped and was looking pretty sad. Dave took the seats apart and repainted all the metal. Then the girls helped G-dad re-upholster them and they look better than new.

Since Greg took the truck when he went back home, Lara planned to ride back to West Linn on Saturday with a friend of hers. In the meantime, I let her use my car to take the girls to the beach. As it turned out, her friend had to cancel out and that left Lara with no transportation to get home. We let her use my car since we were coming into town on Monday for various appointments anyway and we could pick up the car then.

So, Monday we headed into Hillsboro for a dental cleaning and mammogram for me and Dave had to meet with his cardiologist for a heart monitor hookup and then an appointment with his neurologist to find out about the MRI that he had taken to see why he is still unbalanced. The good news is that he did NOT have another stroke but the doctor isn't sure what the problem is. She thinks maybe he has vertigo instead. So he is to do these exercises to try and get his equilibrium back to normal. By the time we headed to West Linn to get the other car we hit the rush-hour traffic. It reminded me once again why I like living in a small town at the coast. After dinner with the family, we headed home and it was almost 9:00 p.m. before we got back. It made for a very long day.

Since the weather has been so nice it gave me a chance to get some more yard work done. It is sure a good thing that I like to work out in the yard. I pulled weeds and brush that was growing along our street and now that the ground is cleared from weeds, I want to put down some weed killer and spread bark dust so that I won't have such a job next time. Believe me the weeds always have a way of returning.

I had to replant my cucumbers again. Between the bugs eating them up and the chipmunks digging them up, I am having a heck of a time raising any kind of vegetable garden this year. The chipmunk population is growing. Every time I look outside I see three or four of them and who knows how many are hiding or are underground. They manage to "plant" sunflower seeds in all of my flower pots and I am forever pulling up sunflower sprouts. They've made themselves right at home in the feeders too!

We came back into town on Thursday so Dave could get the heart monitor removed and we spent the night here in West Linn. Today we're getting up early and heading to Salem to the Marion County Fair so we can watch our two oldest granddaughters, Ashtin and Paige show their pigs that they have raised for 4-H. This is Paige's first competition so we are hoping she does a good job. Ashtin has competed for three years and last year was awarded reserve champion with her pig, After the swine show, we will be heading back to the coast were the temperature is a lot more bearable. It's been 90 every day here in the valley. We have plans to launch the Captain Bell on Saturday, so wish us luck.